Posted
by
kdawson
on Tuesday February 23, 2010 @01:01AM
from the so-many-notes-mister-mozart dept.

DJRumpy writes "The Danish political scientist Bjørn Lomborg won fame and fans by arguing that many of the alarms sounded by environmental activists and scientists — that species are going extinct at a dangerous rate, that forests are disappearing, that climate change could be catastrophic — are bogus. A big reason Lomborg was taken seriously is that both of his books, The Skeptical Environmentalist (in 2001) and Cool It (in 2007), have extensive references, giving a seemingly authoritative source for every one of his controversial assertions. So in a display of altruistic masochism that we should all be grateful for (just as we're grateful that some people are willing to be dairy farmers), author Howard Friel has checked every single citation in Cool It. The result is The Lomborg Deception, which is being published by Yale University Press next month. It reveals that Lomborg's work is 'a mirage,' writes biologist Thomas Lovejoy in the foreword. '[I]t is a house of cards. Friel has used real scholarship to reveal the flimsy nature' of Lomborg's work."

If lomborg had any faith in the veracity of his "science" he would publish it in peer-reviewed journals. As it stands his solitary journal publication [wikipedia.org] was in a sociology journal.

Considering the mountain of propoganda surrounding the issue of AGW (on both sides) any sane spectator will quite rightly continue to ignore his rants until he has the balls to submit them to formal scientific scrutiny.

This is not to say that your link is not informative in the current context and IMHO should be modded as such

There you go - one of the most influential and powerful AGW proponents using his influence to keep journals from printing papers that contradicted some of the basis for his work. Even if he has to "redefine what peer-reviewed literature is!"

Miss.

This isn't about whether the papers be published or not - they were, it's about whether they be cited in the IPCC report or not.

Jones's conspiratorial powers were so great that the papers were cited by the report ("McKitrick, R., and P.J. Michaels, 2004: A test of corrections for extraneous signals in gridded surface temperature data. Clim. Res., 26, 159-173." and "Kalnay, E., and M. Cai, 2003: Impact of urbanization and land-use change on climate. Nature, 423, 528-531.").

It turns out that the papers are crap, as Jones was pointing out in this email. If skeptics wanted to point to bad science in the IPCC reports these are some of the things they would be shouting about the loudest,

A: Correct. It is about manipulating the IPCC, not the peer review literature itself. I dont really know if that strengthens your case, however. For more extensive discussion, head over to the CRU nemesis himself: http://climateaudit.org/2009/12/17/climategatekeeping-2/ [climateaudit.org]

B: But here you go for some cut n paste - how to deep six a "dangerous" paper or journal editor in some easy steps (as far as I know it has not been published so far):

I will be emailing the journal to tell them I'm having nothing moreto do with it until theyrid themselves of this troublesome editor. A CRU person is on theeditorial board, but papersget dealt with by the editor assigned by Hans von Storch.

CheersPhil

Dear all,Tim Osborn has just come across this. Best to ignore probably, sodon't let it spoil yourday. I've not looked at it yet. It results from this journal having anumber of editors. Theresponsible one for this is a well-known skeptic in NZ. He has let a fewpapers through byMichaels and Gray in the past. I've had words with Hans von Storch aboutthis, but got nowhere.Another thing to discuss in Nice !

CheersPhil

"From: Keith BriffaTo: Edward CookSubject: Re: Review- confidential REALLY URGENTDate: Wed Jun 4 13:42:54 2003I am really sorry but I have to nag about that review – Confidentially I now need a hard and if required extensive case for rejecting - to support Dave Stahle’s and really as soon as you can. PleaseKeith"

Hi Keith,Okay, today. Promise! Now something to ask from you. Actually somewhat important too. Igot a paper to review (submitted to the Journal of Agricultural, Biological, andEnvironmental Sciences), written by a Korean guy and someone from Berkeley, that claimsthat the method of reconstruction that we use in dendroclimatology (reverse regression)is wrong, biased, lousy, horrible, etc. They use your Tornetrask recon as the mainwhipping boy. I have a file that you gave me in 1993 that comes from your 1992 paper.Below is part of that file. Is this the right one? Also, is it possible to resurrect thecolumn headings? I would like to play with it in an effort to refute their claims.If published as is, this paper could really do some damage. It is also an ugly paper toreview because it is rather mathematical, with a lot of Box-Jenkins stuff in it. Itwon't be easy to dismiss out of hand as the math appears to be correct theoretically,but it suffers from the classic problem of pointing out theoretical deficiencies,without showing that their improved inverse regression method is actually better in apractical sense. So they do lots of monte carlo stuff that shows the superiority oftheir method and the deficiencies of our way of doing things, but NEVER actually showhow their method would change the Tornetrask reconstruction from what you produced.Your assistance here is greatly appreciated. Otherwise, I will let Tornetrask sink intothe melting permafrost of northern Sweden (just kidding of course).Cheers,

Recently rejected two papers (one for JGR and for GRL) from people saying CRU has itwrong over Siberia. Went to town in both reviews, hopefully successfully. If eitherappearsI will be very surprised, but you never know with GRL.CheersPhil

And another one:

Thanks a bunch Phil,Along lines as my other email, would it be (?) for me to forward this to the chair of our commitee confidentially, and for his internal purposes only, to help bolster the case against MM?? let me knowt

But he hasn't done any science. Or is that your point? His book has collated a whole bunch of other peoples research to make the argument "Yeah climate change is real and human made and largly negative, BUT, our attempts at reversing it are a fools errand". I mean, this is the sort of thing you do when you write a book. He hasn't done any original research, so what is there to submit to a journal? Your creating a crazy argument "You have to submit your research to peer-review!" "But I haven't done any research..." "AHA!".

Not sure who the "he" is that you are refering to, neither have done any climate science but Lomborg claims he has and that his rants should be included in the IPCC reports.

Lomborg paints himself a persecuted DaVinci, a lone voice of scientific genius against the harsh dogma of the establishment. Basically Friel has published a detailed book review debunking that picture, the journal of nature also reviews books and like Friel they do not claim them to be anything more than researched opinion.

Reading that very lengthy rebuttal, one thing becomes clear. Howard Friel does not deserve our time or thought. If you are going to criticize someone's work, you need to be doubly careful that the things you take issue with are valid. Here it appears that the criticism is far less solid than the material it critisizes. This does not make the original material correct as a result, but truely; there is nothing to see here, move along.

If he'd be interested in critique, he'd have published a paper rather than a book. This is par for the course for Lomborg. He's been pretty much laughed out of the room by any scientist. I haven't even seen the skeptics refer to his work in a long time.

It's been a while, but I read 'Cool It' and recall that the premise was (generally) "Scientists have proven climate change is real. It's now up to ECONOMISTS to determine which would be worse for humanity- to allow the climate to continue changing or to restructure our economy to prevent climate change."

IIRC, his general premise is that the ball shouldn't be in the court of climate scientists any more. That is indeed a scary thought for folks who earn their livings studying climate change. If we all boug

but, he does seem to admit in the first page that they are both engaging in "selective or incomplete quotation, misrepresentation of
source material, and even outright fabrication"

That's not what he says:

Unfortunately, it is obvious that Friel has no interest in fair-minded criticism or honest disagreement. Rather, he seems determined to portray me as devious, deceptive, and intellectually dishonest. Ironically, in his zeal to do so, he repeatedly commits the very sins he accuses me of—selective or incomplete quotation, misrepresentation of source material, and even outright fabrication. Rather than engaging with my books on their own terms, he caricatures my work and then attacks it.

It's well established that most people don't actually check footnotes[1]. Thus you can construct an original argument, footnote a few contained facts [2], and the presence of the footnotes lends an air of support to the entire argument [3].

Without reading both books, I can't take sides on the merits. But I will say some of the stuff in TFA sets off my alarms--like spending a footnote on a WHO report just to cite the population of Europe.

"Without reading both books, I can't take sides on the merits. But I will say some of the stuff in TFA sets off my alarms--like spending a footnote on a WHO report just to cite the population of Europe."

When doing math, statistical sources matter. But here we have something substantial to discuss. Is Lomborg dishonest in this case? Read along for the answer!

Friel: "But Lomborg's only source for these figures—a chart in the statistical annex of a 2004 World Health Organization report—containsno data on human mortality due to excess heat or cold. In fact, the words "excess heat" and "excess cold" make no appearance in the WHO document; neither does the word "heat," and the word "cold" appears only once in a reference unrelated to death due to excess cold.

Lomborg's reference to the WHO document, which allegedly supports his claim that two hundred thousand people die each year in Europe from excess heat, reads in its entirety: "207,000, based on a simple average of the available cold and heat deaths per million, cautiously excluding London and using WHO’s estimate for Europe’s population of 878 million (WHO, 2004a:121).”

However, page 121 of the 2004 WHO report—The World Health Report 2004: Changing History— which is what this source references, lists no data on cold- and heatrelated deaths per million, or for cold- and heat-related deaths in any context.

Likewise, Lomborg's very next reference-to support his claim that 1.5 million Europeans die annually from excess cold - reads in its entirety: "1.48 million, estimated in the same way as total heat deaths."

Thus, Lomborg's references indicate that page 121 of the 2004 WHO report is the source of his estimates of annual heat- and cold-related deaths in Europe; however, this page in the WHO report lists no statistics for either cold- or heat-related deaths. Consequently, there is no apparent basis here or elsewhere in Cool It for Lomborg's claim that 1.5 million Europeans die annually from excess cold. [LD, p. 86, emphasis added]

Lomborg: "In fact, the text and first endnote in this section make it very clear where the figures are sourced from: “Based on the summary of the biggest European heat and cold study (Keatinge, et al., 2000, p. 672).” (p. 170).

In the UK edition of the book, there is even a figure with the numbers, with the further explanation: “estimated in the text, using Keatinge et al., 2000:672.” (p. 233, CIUK) Friel’s claim that I relied on a WHO document that does not support my case is astonishing and profoundly disingenuous.

I clearly used the WHO report solely to provide an estimate of Europe’s population (because WHO uses the standard geographical definition of Europe to the Ural Mountains).This is evident in the text that Friel himself quoted: “and using WHO’s estimate for Europe’s population of 878 million (WHO, 2004a:121).”

Finding this study on Google Scholar took me all of two seconds using the reference provided by Lomborg (in his book).

In short, from this example, picked by you - not me, it plainly evident that is Friels honesty or literacy that should be in question, not Lomborgs. This is likely to be representative of the "debunking" in its entirety, going from what I have read of the rebuttal so far.

I haven't read his books, but I live in Denmark so Lomborg gets quite a bit of press here, especially under the climate change conference in December. In interviews he's always come across as a pragmatist more than a skeptic.

He has two main arguments:

1) Think about the return on investment.

Let's say we can cool the earth one degree by spending a trillion dollars. Is it worth the investment? What do we really get out of it? How many other problems could have been fixed with that money?

2) The current approach to fighting climate change is wrong.

UN treaties and money aren't going to stop the developing world from using fossil fuels. The only surefire way to get off of coal is to develop something that is cheaper. Instead of giving money to developing countries to bribe them not to pollute, we should invest the money in new technology, so that in 10, 20, 30 years we can say "here, this is cheaper than coal and doesn't pollute".

I think both of his points are important to consider, though I don't agree with him completely. There are risks to his solution - what if our investments don't bear fruit, and coal is still the cheapest energy source in 30 years? What if climate change causes political destabilization so we don't have enough time to get finished?

I don't think anybody has a perfect solution, but I do think that Lomborg contributes positively to the debate.

Let's say we can cool the earth one degree by spending a trillion dollars. Is it worth the investment? What do we really get out of it? How many other problems could have been fixed with that money?

If it were a mere one trillion dollars for the whole world, it'd really be a drop in the bucket and well worth the investment. Aside from the issue of ROI, one has to consider the externalities of not spending the trillion dollars. Look at the mostly current financial/economic crisis. How much do you think that cost countries? How much do you think will be the cost of long-term shifting weather patterns? I'd imagine it might trivially be a lot more than most people would care to stomach compared to doing something now.

2) The current approach to fighting climate change is wrong.

UN treaties and money aren't going to stop the developing world from using fossil fuels. The only surefire way to get off of coal is to develop something that is cheaper. Instead of giving money to developing countries to bribe them not to pollute, we should invest the money in new technology, so that in 10, 20, 30 years we can say "here, this is cheaper than coal and doesn't pollute".

Funny, but that's the main reason cap and trade is such a good idea. It causes developed countries to start polluting significantly less, raises the current costs of coal/oil/etc (inherently making long-term investments in other energy sources possibly viable), allows for the collected taxes to be pushed into new energy technology, and hopefully the result will be energy that effectively is cheaper than the coal/oil/etc's original price. Even if the whole energy technology step doesn't work to produce something cheaper than coal/oil/etc, the system will both have proven that you can still be a developed country using massively less amounts of coal/oil/etc per capita (meaning developed countries, mimicking developed countries, need not believe they'll tank for what might others seem a reckless course of action) and almost certainly have higher efficiency technology to export to other countries so they'll inherently use less coal/oil/etc (since the efficiency technology will have been created in a [mostly] market based system and should be generally economical sound anywhere).

What if climate change causes political destabilization so we don't have enough time to get finished?

We're going to see that anyways. China has already taken some pretty bold steps about securing oil supplies for its developing economy. That's a major reason for the great increase in the price of oil; that is, if China hadn't been securing and using those oil wells, other western powers would have for their still increasing oil consumption. You can only pump so much oil out of the ground at one time, and so at some point Americans and Chinese will no longer be able to simply expand through more oil extraction. At that point, increasing the efficiency of technology will be necessary. In the interim, both China and America's economy will suffer rather badly (the US needs ~2.5% economic growth yearly just to maintain itself and China needs something close to ~10%) as oil prices will skyrocket.

We need to be developing alternative energies and efficiency technology now and not wait until "the market" takes care of things. "The market" doesn't take into consideration that while it might work hypothetically in a perfect world given enough time, in the real world a drastic short-term change in supply or demand can result in the sort of political instability that results in a lot of "force" upon a lot of people. And that can be very unpleasant for everyone involved.

You are right and I wish my mod points had not expired yesterday. The Republicans shouting "Drill, baby, drill" did not seem to understand that for Alaskan oil to work, the oil price would need to be much higher than it is now. They do not understand the increasing marginalisation of reserves.

Compared to Europe and the Far East, oil consumption is very high. It takes about twice as much oil to transport an American a mile as a European or a Japanese. It takes twice as much oil to heat or cool large American

... is not his actual arguments (important as they may be), but rather that the attacks on him - in their viscousness, dishonesty and general rage-inducing pompousness - highlight how venal large swathes of the "scientific establishment" have become.

He's not just saying "Nope, this isn't a problem, ignore it, don't worry, etc, etc." A person like that is much easier to dismiss. What he's saying is "Yes, this is a problem, but not a big one, and certainly not one worth all the money and effort being proposed to fix it. Instead, we should spend that on other things that would have a much bigger impact on quality of life." More or less he's not disagreeing with the fundamental premise or conclusion, he's disagreeing with the policies being proposed because of that.

This drives the global warming proponents totally mad. Most of them seem to be of the opinion that what they have to do is convince people that global warming is real, and caused by humans. Once that is done, people should be willing to accept whatever policies they say are necessary. No questioning of the costs or the utility, they've proven the problem and now whatever they say needs to happen should happen without further question.

So Lomborg has become one of their top enemies because he doesn't fundamentally disagree on the idea that the world is warming, just that it is worth while to try and solve when there are so many other problems to human life. For that, they hate him.

That is one of the things that makes me question motives in this whole thing. I can understand exasperation with people who believe your research is incorrect/false/made up if your truly believe it is right. You think you've got it correct, done a lot of work in that regard, you get mad when people say "Nuh uh!". However, when someone is disagreeing not with that, but with the policies you demand and you get even more angry at them, well that makes me wonder: Is the research really what's important to you, or are you using it just to try and drive policies that you want, regardless of their use? It would seem to me that how to deal with the problem would be open for discussion, yet discussion of that generates the most backlash. Makes you wonder.

Having read Lomberg's response to the criticism, I'm more comfortable with his conclusions than I am with Friel's. However, the last word probably hasn't been written/spoken on the subject. Both sides of the argument fall short of absolute proof, but Lomberg seems to be a better mathematician.

I am basing my opinion on incomplete information (as are all the posters on this topic) since, a. Friel's complete book is is not completely available to us and, b. it's a lot of dang work to analyze the books side-by-side in any case. Despite the lack of sufficient info, people will go out and vote (some of them anyway) and the minority of the voters and the general citizenry will be stuck with the results.

The information at hand doesn't support a conclusion of immediate emergency, so I'm holding out against any hasty drastic actions that mostly serve to make Al Gore richer. The urgency is for more research done a manner that we can all trust, untainted by political considerations, BEFORE it becomes a real emergency. Legitimate scientists will examine all sides of the problem before recommending any long-term solutions.

"Glaciers in the Himalaya are receding faster than in any other part of the world (see Table 10.9) and, if the present rate continues, the likelihood of them disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is Page 18 of 27 very high if the Earth keeps warming at the current rate. Its total area will likely shrink from the present 500,000 to 100,000 km2 by the year 2035 (WWF, 2005). [IPCC, 2007c, p. 493]"

Touche. My bad, absolutely. But whatever; I was clearly trolling. I didn't feel a huge need to be totally accurate. For all the responses I got about yeast being a fungus, I guess Tinactin probably sells pretty well among the/. set.

Though I agree that humans are a significant contributor to climate change arguing the point is a waste of effort. Once the window is broken it really doesn't matter whether it was Billy or Jane who was the culprit, the most important thing is to replace the glass to prevent the basement from flooding.

***because of our placement in a Milankovitch Cycle so it would be very odd if temperature was not increasing like we are seeing.***

Sigh... Milankovitch cycles are real. They clearly affect climate at any given location. Plenty of evidence to support that. They do NOT affect total energy received from the sun over the course of the year which remains constant. Further, there is no agreement whatsoever amongst those who believe that the cycles nonetheless affect planetary temperature on exactly what the affect of Milankovitch changes are or where we are headed.

The best part is that even on that very page, if you match up the time-lines you can see that the temperature and CO2 graphs don't line up, and that the temperature starts to spike before CO2 amount does.

Unfortunately, there's no -1 misinformative mod.

That is to be expected. Normally, temperature starts to rise due to e.g. distance to the sun decreasing slightly, which leads to increased CO2 which enhances the effect of the warming, causing further CO2 to be released until a new balance is achieved (essentially that the energy absorbed from the sun equals the earths black-body radiation). CO2 increase with temperature because CO2 is less soluble in warm (sea)-water, and a number of other effects (Tundra melting is often mentioned as a big one, though I don't personally know.). Now, into this system we (the humans) release enough CO2 to increase the concentration by what, 30%? What do *you* think will happen?

That CO2 must warm the earth can also be concluded directly by looking at the absorbtion bands of CO2. You could even calculate the approximate effect (though not the feedback loops) from this, the atmospheric and distribution of CO2 and from the distribution of the electromagnetic waves in the atmosphere.

But of course, you knew all this. What pisses me off about all this that while the above is well-known science and has been for a long time, the economic aspects are far from clear to me. Is it worth it to curtail the warming? How much will it cost to adapt vs. prevention? Those are the interesting questions, but few discusses this:/

You deserve upmods. It seemingly cannot be stated enough, because the "skeptics" don't get it: of COURSE temperature leads CO2 levels. What would a sudden, pre-temperature rise of CO2 levels come from? There wasn't much coal burned in the ice ages.

When no CO2 is added to the system, it merely works as a feedback for temperature changes, magnifying them. Oceans get warmer, reducing their capacity to dissolve gases, releasing more CO2. Rotting vegetation trapped in ice melts, releases methane and CO2. Fortunately, the additional CO2 released from warming is not enough to cause more warming than what released it, so it doesn't run away, it stabilizes at a new, higher temperature.

But when CO2 is added to the system from outside (fossil fuels trapped in the earth for ages), it's not just a feedback. It's a forcing, something that drives temperature change.

So, that CO2 followed temperature rises during the end of the ice ages is not evidence against global warming. It's what you would expect to happen when there are no humans around to burn gigatons of coal, if current theories of carbon feedback are correct.

Normally, temperature starts to rise due to e.g. distance to the sun decreasing slightly, which leads to increased CO2 which enhances the effect of the warming, causing further CO2 to be released until a new balance is achieved (essentially that the energy absorbed from the sun equals the earths black-body radiation). CO2 increase with temperature because CO2 is less soluble in warm (sea)-water, and a number of other effects (Tundra melting is often mentioned as a big one, though I don't personally know.). Now, into this system we (the humans) release enough CO2 to increase the concentration by what, 30%? What do *you* think will happen?

You have such a simple-minded view of the planetary climate...that is...unfortunately...wrong. Planetary temperatures are not correlated with (in the order you mention them) 1)short-term earth-solar distance, 2)CO2 increases, 3)solar absorbtion-black body radiation 'balance', 4)warming sea water CO2 solubility decrease (also bad chemistry as carbonate chemistry is far more complex than just 'CO2 solubility') or 5) tundra melting.

That CO2 must warm the earth can also be concluded directly by looking at the absorbtion bands of CO2. You could even calculate the approximate effect (though not the feedback loops) from this, the atmospheric and distribution of CO2 and from the distribution of the electromagnetic waves in the atmosphere.

Apparently you have never actually looked at the absorption bands for CO2. There is already more than sufficient CO2 in the atmosphere to absorb all of the IR radiation that is capable of being absorbed by CO2, within the first few hundred meters of the atmosphere above the surface. Once absorbed, the energy is not trapped but is immediately re-emitted. The wavelength of the reemitted thermal radiation is a probability distribution depending ONLY on temperature that can be predicted with Planck's law and it is NOT concentrated within the narrow CO2 absorption band so almost all of that re-emitted raditation is free to radiate out into space untouched any further by your nemesis CO2.

But of course, you knew all this. What pisses me off about all this that while the above is well-known science and has been for a long time, the economic aspects are far from clear to me.

It's precisely all of that 'well-known science' that is giving you so much difficulty.

But if the cause isn't man made, then we can say "don't blame me!" when disaster strikes.

Imagine if this thinking was applied to other areas. Hurricanes aren't man made, so we don't need to get out of the way. Floods aren't man made so I can build my house on the river bank. Lightning is a natural phenomena so I can keep golfing in the rain.

Technically correct, they show a feedback from CO2, not a forcing, which is what you would expect. There were no things at the end of the ice ages to release CO2 in large amounts, except higher temperatures themselves (which in turn was caused by Milankovitch cycles). As the earth warmed, CO2 was released from oceans and frozen vegetation, causing further warming.

Without the feedback from CO2, the Milankovitch cycles would only cause a very modest change in temperature - not nearly sufficient to cause the ice age/interglacial cycles we know.

Before humans, temperature was driving the change, and CO2 caused the feedback.

Now, CO2 is driving the change (cause we have coal power plants now), and temperature causes the feedback (because warming up the oceans still reduces their capacity to hold CO2)

That's unfortunately because the article proves that the "climate skeptics" are frauds too, they've lied and mislead and deceived people for their own benefit which, of course, according to your own standard means they are wrong and can't be believed.

So there, the world must be colder because it's can't be getting warmer because the scientists and the CRU are mean, the non-scientists and IPCC made a mistake in a 400 page report, and the so-called skeptics are continuously and repeated proven wrong over and over again. That's the only possible conclusion. Right? Right?

Damn right! There is a huge lack of respect for the amount of money and effort the petroleum industry has put into setting the story straight. Listen people, there is no story here, go back to burning everything you can lay your hands on, and we'll tell you if there is a problem.

Well it's not like one day oil will cost 50 dollars a barrel and the next it'll all be gone.

As the reserves run dry there will be years during which the price climbs and climbs and people will switch to other fuels.Ships that run on oil getting too costly to run?well then some smart buggers will build some more nuclear powered ships or ships which are more efficient or ships which are powered by fuel cells or any other method and they'll make a lot of money because they'll be offering to transport goods far

One of the things that REALLY bugs me about climate research is seeing LEGITIMATE scientists use the word "SKEPTIC" as a SMEAR.

Scientists are SUPPOSED to be skeptic, and I understand that this is not what the phrase is meant to convey, but the mere idea of labeling a scientists "skeptic" to smear him shows how political scientists in general have become. Remember when they were all about the pursuit of truth and knowledge?

I guess it sounds better than "denier", (which sounds like some McCarthy-era witch-hunt-ism), but why can't scientists keep their professionalism in situations which become politicized?

It's a smear only in a very specific context: Lomborg and his ilk are, unfortunately, often identified as "skeptics" in the press. They're no such thing, of course -- "denier" or "denialist" is much more accurate* -- but when you have a bunch of people spouting pseudoscientific garbage who are handed the "skeptic" label as a gift, it's inevitable that those who point out the garbage will appear to be "smearing skeptics." The only answer appears to be to point out as often as possible that they aren't ske

The problem is not, nor has it ever been that lunatics with their hand out the window yelling, "it feels fine!" are shouted down or ignored. The problem is that over the past 20 years the understanding has evolved that there is a "correct" result, and anyone working to disprove that result is an enemy to be scrutinized, tied to suspicious parties and ostracized.

By contrast, there are respected scientists in every other field attempting to disprove established theories, and should their work pan out, they would publish without fear of immediate rejection by their peers.

It is the nature of scientific theory that it is tested and attacked. That is why we value a theory limke evolution, which has survived these constat attempts to disprove or reduce its scope for a very long time.

Of what value is a body of theory that can only be confirmed, but which brooks no attempt to disprove?

Let's try a little thought experiment, shall we? Two scenarios:1) Let's imagine that you are working on the bleeding edge of science and you're investigating a question that no-one knows the answer to, like "why does Nt-acetylation of bulk proteins happen?". You do some clever research, and whaddya know, you come up with an interesting answer: "it's because acetylation can function as a degradation signal". That forces a need to revisit thinking on protein turnover, a larger topic, and may even mean that we need to think again about exactly how homeostasis works. So you write it all up and if you can get the paper past your clever colleagues who do peer review, you might get published in Science and you can be very proud of yourself. Look, it's happened here!http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/327/5968/966 [sciencemag.org]2) Now, let's imagine that you investigate something a bit more fundamental to modern biological science. Say, the idea that DNA encodes genetic information about the shape of proteins. Let's say you invent a clever experiment and the findings are very striking -- they appear to show that DNA doesn't encode that information after all! Now for the thought experiment bit: do you think that the standards and scrutiny that will be applied to your claim will be higher or lower than in scenario 1, given that your results will require the setting aside / reinterpretation of an enormous mass of prior experimental results and accepted scientific theory. Why, that's right! Your results will be subjected to more careful scrutiny. They will have to be replicated, validated, tested etc etc every which way from Sunday, because the inherent balance of probabilities is that your results are wrong or artefactual or explicable within the current framework, and that the prior thinking was right. It's not *impossible* that the opposite holds true, but it *is* extremely unlikely.

People who seek to demonstrate that anthropogenic climate change is not happening are much closer to scenario 2 than scenario 1. Scientists will quite reasonably say, "just before we chuck out all the accumulated evidence and thinking about how the world works and accept your argument that you've shown it that is, in fact, possible for humans to add net tens of billions of tons of gases such as CO2 and CH4 to the atmosphere in the space of decades without it having an impact on climate, do you mind terribly if we take a very long hard look at your evidence and reasoning?"

1. Oops! You used the wrong word there -- you said there are *rates* of increase / decrease that overwhelm anything we've seen in modern times. I'm aware that the *total change* was much larger, but not that the *change per unit of time* was much larger. Rate is important, as faster rates reduce the time for species to adapt.2. What is this rubbish about little old us? There are more than 6 billion of us on the planet. Why wouldn't a very large number of resource-using large mammals be able to affect the planet? We can and do change physical geography on an ongoing basis -- there's virtually no square inch of England that isn't different from its "natural" state due to active management by humans. We can and do deplete resources or poison environments so that they are uninhabitable.3. What is this rubbish about "trace gas" and "parts per million"? What is inherently implausible about changes in the quantum of trace gases (it's not just CO2, y'know) having real effects on physical systems?4. Overall, you've missed the point: there's a ton of physical evidence that climate change is happening (and quite a bit for it having an impact on ecosystems too), plus well-worked through theory with good evidence for how ("the greenhouse effect"). *That's* what will need reconciliation with an assertion that there is no climate change.In the end, there are two arguments to be discussed:1) Is it happening?2) What do we do? -- ranging from nothing to something.

I assure you that I'm quite as attached to home comforts as you -- I just happen to believe that the answers are pretty clear:1) Yes, it is2) Doing something is more likely to preserve more of my comforts (and fellow human beings) than doing nothing. You clearly take the opposite view.

Even if Lomborg was dishonest -- and you have no evidence of that -- the AGW side has been dishonest too, so by your own argument, anyone else could say, "grant-receiving scentists pushing AGW feel they can profitably resort to dishonesty to prove their point."

Here we speak of Lomborg, and you immediately begin talking about un-cited "other people" who somehow make Lomborg's mistakes disappear in a puff of equivalency.

I don't know about the intersection between deniers and creationists, but they do seem to have a similar philosophy. Both seem to want to think that people do not affect their environment very much. If the creationists admit that, then they couldn't ascribe bad things happening to people to a vengeful G-d. That in turn would mean they have no mooring to achieve their political ends of telling everyone else what to do...a bit like progressives and liberals but with the shadow of G-d as the enforcer. Also, t

You should go and visit "uncommon descent [uncommondescent.com]" the blog HQ of intelligent design. They're always bringing up AGW skepticism, since the notion of a far-reaching conspiracy of scientific propaganda and elitist repression is the same excuse they use to wave away the fact that the overwhelming majority of scientific opinion is in favour of evolution. Throwing their lot in with other denialists "makes their worldview make sense".

Global warming appears to have been occurring for the last 30-50 years.

This warming may only be a short-term fluctuation but could be a longer-term trend.

Evidence is still inconclusive whether man is causing the warming.

No "natural" causes for global warming have been confirmed.

One possible new theory is that galactic cosmic radiation (GCR) modulated by solar activity affects low-level cloud cover and is causing the warming.

Global warming may affect some parts of our society negatively but would likely benefit others. In fact, the current warming trend may be returning our global climate closer to that prevalent in the Garden of Eden. Compared to climate changes which have occurred in earth history, a temperature rise of a few degrees is a small fluctuation which will not lead to a complete melting of the polar caps or another ice age. Earth has a stable environmental system with many built-in feedback systems to maintain a uniform climate. It was designed by God and has only been dramatically upset by catastrophic events like the Genesis Flood. Catastrophic climate change will occur again in the future, but only by God's intervention in a sudden, violent conflagration of planet Earth in the end times

The tactic used by Lomborg (quote mining [rationalwiki.com]) is the definitive modus operandi of a denialist. It is the bread and butter of Creationists [talkorigins.org], and for the person employing it, it is a strong indicator of either severe cognitive dissonance or outright lying.

I think the whole thing has become so politicized that an honest viewpoint from either side is rare. The global warming believers think it's such a big impact if it's true that they feel they can't honestly present counter-evidence, and the unbelievers think the cost is so high that it can't be paid without incontrovertible evidence.

Unfortunately, climate science doesn't have a great record (the planetary ecosystem and climate are pretty goddam complicated). At the same time, we will never have evidence that the average idiot will understand and accept for anything as complex as a checking account.

Most people, myself included, have no real basis on which to make a decision, so we pick the side with the people we trust.

Personally, I trust scientists much more than businessmen. Good scientists are trained to be brutally honest with themselves, and to use methods that expose rather than hide flaws in their own reasoning.

Businessmen are trained to be confident in their abilities and conclusions regardless of reality.

This means that when businessmen look at the objective opinions of good scientists, with their "given this" and "see chart X for exceptions", they blow them off. Then they spend millions pointing out how the scientists can't even make up their mind.

For me, it's an easy choice. That doesn't mean that I am immune to arguments either way, just that I tend to listen with my own slant, and I recognize it.

I personally wish we would just give respected climate scientists some money and some peace for a couple of years to fight it out among themselves without worrying about the viewpoint of uninformed idiots, but I know it's not going to happen.

As someone who believes in man-made climate change I can assure both you and the GP that you are completely wrong about my beliefs.

I don't think we need to give up our modern lives and return to some kind of hippy-farming-commune existence. We just need to develop technology that doesn't pump CO2 into the atmosphere. Sure, that does cost money to develop, but so did drilling for oil or burning coal to generate electricity.

Even if you don't believe in climate change the benefits of not burning coal and oil should be pretty obvious. You can see pollution all around us in the form of the dust and dirt that accumulates on buildings and in my house (which is next to a main road).

Don't think I'm attacking you personally either. We need to change things at government and industrial levels. In the end though there comes a point where we are going to have to force the Chelsea Tractor / Hummer drivers into less polluting cars. I don't see a problem with that - we don't allow people to piss in swimming pools because the majority of people don't want to swim in that. You can't expect to go around spewing crap into the air when there are just as good alternatives that don't do that.

We are not there yet by a long way, but one day we will be and that's all I'm saying:

- We need to develop less polluting technology, if not because of climate change then because of pollution and the finite nature of the oil and coal supplies.

- Eventually technology will get there, but in the mean time I'm still flying long haul and you can still drive your tractor around town. I own a Colt with super-efficient engine, mainly because it's cheaper for me to run. If electric was cheaper I would buy one of these too. Totally selfish and nothing to do with the green lobby.

Based on the fact that the numbers he used for deforestation were not applicable to the problem, aggregated over different collection methods, and completely irrelevant to the problem caused by deforestation: loss of habitat for endemic species.

And yes, I read his crap. It was a massive disappointment, and the only conclusion I could come to was that he was either ignorant beyond belief, or dishonest.

So yes, we can ignore him. As for your statement "that global warming "scientists" were dishonest in their research", that's not true either. The closest thing that has been demonstrated is that some researchers are human and petty in their responses to other people's requests and research. That's a long way from demonstrating that EVERY researcher has faked his research.

Feel free to argue otherwise, but to be credible, you're going to have to demonstrate that every single paper arguing for AGW is dishonest. Go ahead.

You do realize, too, that we actual have HARD PROOF that global warming "scientists" were dishonest in their research, research that the IPCC relied on for its conclusions... right?

Out of thousands of independent studies done by thousands of scientists that generally lead to the conclusion that climate change is happening and man is most likely the cause, you would ignore all of that because a few scientists might have been dishonest. Yet you would believe one man who has now been shown that there is some issues with his work. If you are truly skeptical you should throw his work too. That still leads to many, many more scientists who have hard data that climate change is happening.

There you go again. Conflating "climate change" with whether man is the most likely cause. Its really rather rich. The prime highlight of the IPCCs AR3 was to "forget" the existence of climate change prior to the 19th century. Natural variation over the past thousand years was reduced to quiet gradual downtrend with an abrupt surge upward in the 1800s. In so doing they discarded thousands of studies and work of thousands who previously carefully documented periods of great warming and cooling throughout the history of man.

But their claim was bespectacled from the start by way of special pleading they had explained away each interruption in warming that occurred during the 20th century, but then after the report was published, yet another unexpected cooling period emerged.

Suddenly the meme switched from being about "Global Warming" to being "Climate Change". The focus shifted from temperatures to sea-levels and hurricanes. Yet this turned out to be an even more tenuous footing. Its already no longer considered reputable among intellectual circles to discuss such extravagances. Eventually the talking point was settled upon: weather is not climate. The recent cooling is just weather.

Indeed, weather is not climate. Climate is the expectation of weather--and so yes, it surely does matter when year after year goes by somewhat cooler than had been predicted by the IPCCs latest report.

Meanwhile, the very people who had steadfastly refused to deny climate-change are now labeled the climate change deniers. This stemmed from an Orwellian campaign to redefine terminology. Suddenly believing in climate-change meant believing in anthropogenic climate change. The language literally twisted to be an embodiment of the "one true belief"--no need for that pesky modifier anthropogenic, and all the better to co-opt what everyone knows: climate changes.

Several very cogent critiques of the AR3 temperature series have been published which eviscerated that graph as a product of flawed statistical methods and bad data. Yet a loud cadre continues to deny any problem exists, and banks on the lack of specialized knowledge among the public and other scientists to trade on their word alone.

And, no, we're saying that there is no contribution from Man. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but its effect on temperature depends on poorly understood feedback effects. These effects are in part also responsible for the long history of natural temperature variation that the IPCC otherwise ignores. Ultimately, what it comes down to is this: The IPCC claims a temperature rise of 2C/century. To arrive at this number they assume almost all strong feedbacks are amplifying rather moderating the C02 driven warming. Why does this matter? Much of the impetus for "ACTION NOW!" stems from the notion of a climate tipping point, but if the feedback effects are more moderating than the IPCC claims, this is highly unlikely.

Suddenly the meme switched from being about "Global Warming" to being "Climate Change".

The shift was a result of people not understanding that the term "global warming" referred to the mean global termperature. The media, and Joe Sixpack, did not understand that this meant some regions could still cool, and hence the meme that any cooling disproves global warming [newscientist.com] was born.

... and when you've finished counting, subtract all the scientists who asked for their names to be removed due to being misquoted in the summaries and conclusions (written by politicians and influenced by news reports and other media), but that the IPCC chose to include anyway.

When you have an algorithm, for instance, that produces the 'hockey stick' even when fed random numbers, that is positive proof that the numbers have been cooked - manipulated in order to produce the predetermined outcome.

Yes but we don't have such algorithms do we? Instead we have models such as GISS-E [nasa.gov] which you can download and run on your *nix box at home.

What's sad is that useful idiots [wikipedia.org] like you keep dancing around my simple request for evidence. I know the red-herring you are refering to. I can only assume you don't want to post it because it has been debunked to death.

So now we have a celebrity science pissing-match on our hands. This is simple, IPCC was married with politics, like much of the entire debate. Everyone back to the lab, the field, the research. Stop pandering to politicians and environmentalists, and come up with some science! Until then, no I'm not taking you seriously.

That's absurd. Your sweeping generalization ignores the decades of research poured into the topic by research groups from all over the world. There is ongoing research continually improving upon current models with updated and refined data. You can go take a look at the thousands upon thousands of journal articles written by these scientists, assuming you can even understand the jargon.

such is life. Some look for truth; some for excuses. If your focus is truth, don't be dismayed by the bleating; smile and move on. If you can't help yourself, leave a sarcastic comment and move on. Those that need to justify themselves will do so, no matter the cost.

Even if we are how are we going to fix it? Limit CO2 emissions by something like cap and trade? Great concept but India, China etc are not going to play ina game that is detrimental to their growing manufacturing industries. Or perhaps we create green energy solutions, problem is none of those solutions are costeffective to be self sustaining. If we are warming the planet who is to say it is not actually a positive thing?

Even if we are how are we going to fix it? Limit CO2 emissions by something like cap and trade? Great concept but India, China etc are not going to play in
a game that is detrimental to their growing manufacturing industries. Or perhaps we create green energy solutions, problem is none of those solutions are cost
effective to be self sustaining. If we are warming the planet who is to say it is not actually a positive thing?

I see this argument rather often, and I think it fails to see the point. The US has the largest GDP in the world BY FAR. It has the biggest and most robust economy by an order of magnitude, and nearly all gigantic leaps in technological innovation occur here because of the vast consumer market and potential profits (at least when Republicans aren't stymying innovation by giving away money to the rich).
If the US creates a cap and trade system that rewards innovators and penalizes fossil fuel users, there is no doubt an explosion of innovation will arrive in the field. Companies like nanosolar would be only the tip of the iceberg.

Most European and Asian countries already have gas prices more than twice as high as ours. Just imagine the massive shift in capital to innovative startups that would have occurred over the last two decades had the US taxed gasoline appropriately. Imagine the massive private expenditures into developing consumer-grade alternative energy products. It's just mind-boggling to think what the US could do if it were as forward thinking as some other countries are.

Why don't we just give all Americans incurable diseases while we're at it to stimulate the medical industry properly? Snarky sounding, but perhaps you're right, the US has shown a fairly strong track record for solving problems that it can actually be motivated to deal with.

It's worth pointing out though that the high cost of gasoline outside of the US has been pushing large numbers of people to CNG, which although less less polluting is still not a long term solution to the problem, simply a delaying ef

>Most European and Asian countries already have gas>prices more than twice as high as ours. Just>imagine the massive shift in capital to innovative>startups that would have occurred over the last>two decades had the US taxed gasoline appropriately.

I see this argument frequently, but it ignores the simple reality that unlike in Europe and Asia, the American economy is based on a highly mobile workforce able to commute great distances by automobile. The middle class, in particular, is enabled by and enriched by the automobile and cheap gasoline--the wealthier can live in expensive neighborhoods close to work, and the poor live wherever they can while commuting as little as possible; but, the middle class often work in areas where they could either not afford nearby housing which caters to the more affluent, or where nearby housing caters to the poor.

That's not always the case, of course, but it often is and the middle class has thrived on the ability to live in cheaper yet comfortable neighborhoods further from job centers--i.e., living in the suburbs while commuting to the city, or living in the country and commuting to the burbs. There's also a greater mobility and variety of jobs available to the middle class thanks to cheap gas: where I live, many commute to Washington, D.C., many others to Richmond, and a few to Charlottesville--meaning the job markets of 2.5 major cities are effectively local. Tax gas at a high rate, and people will have less employment mobility, fewer competitive opportunities, and lower overall wages due to the lowered competition among employers in formerly-neighboring employment centers. Additionally, with permanently expensive gas making long commutes cost-prohibitive for the middle class, there would be a huge migration out of the burbs and into more urban areas--where are all the urban poor going to move when whole cities are gentrified almost overnight? Into deserted suburbs with few native local job opportunities?

Tax gas at a high rate, and the mobile workforce and all the competitive advantages it bestows evaporates; the middle class would be eviscerated, and the poor would be displaced. Like it or not, there is no viable public and/or mass transit in most of the U.S.--we haven't needed it thanks to cheap gas, nor has it been as practical as in Europe thanks to our sprawling landmass.

So, do we heavily invest in public/mass transit now in a crash program, to the tune of trillions of dollars almost all at once, so we can end our reliance on cheap gas? No, that's impractical, too expensive, and no one has either the political will or political capital. Do we just levy those high gas taxes, and see if the dire predictions are false? No, because even if it wouldn't destroy the middle class, it would destroy so many political careers that no one is dumb enough to try it--remember that when oil stayed above $100/barrel for a record number of weeks not long ago and U.S. gas prices stayed at record levels, populist anger boiled so hot that Congress was subpoenaing oil executives and threatening to tax their profits and repeal gas taxes and doing ANYTHING to keep a lid on popular sentiments that threatened to derail every incumbent in their wake.

So no, there will not be high gas taxes in this country, nor should there be. What there should be is a plan to phase out gasoline, not through punitive taxes aimed at the working classes but through taxes and legislative pressures on automakers to phase in certain percentages of electric or hybrid vehicles by target dates. We mandate automakers to include lots of once-expensive tech which has since come down in manufacturing cost; why not, in the name of national security as well as the environment, mandate targeted percentages of electric offerings? If prices of new cars do rise in the short term while early adopters bear the brunt, so be it--the more financially challenged can stick with their old cars for a few years more until costs come down. It may seem unrealistic to exp

And which politician is going to vote to lower his constituents standard of living? No one who wants to be re-elected. Hell, no one who wants any kind of legacy, because anything that affects the bulk of the citizenry as badly as over $3 / gallon gas did the other year will be promptly repealed by the politicians still in office who want to stay in office--or not be lynched.

As eloquently explained in one of the above posts, major increases in the cost of gasoline would wreak havoc on the economy and the middle-class. I disagree with the poster that the middle-class would be hardest hit--2008's insane gas prices hurt the so-called "blue-collar" class the worst. Those were the guys who were just making ends meet, and whose jobs often depending on driving: truckers, cabbies, deliverymen, etc.

In addition, the higher cost of a necessity, gasoline, means less money to spend on anything else, so luxuries go by the wayside. What happens to the economy when people stop spending on anything except absolute necessities? If you answer, "the stock market crash and recession that started in 2008 and is still going on", you, sir, are a winner! (Yes, mismanagement by the big banks and insurance companies who apparently didn't plan for the possibility of an economic downturn exacerbated the crash, but there would have been no crash without that economic downturn).

In an ironic twist, when our gasoline prices approached those of Europe's, it clobbered Europe's economy as well. Seems like people just weren't buying European imports and taking European vacations any more...

I'm all for switching from fossil fuels to renewables as quickly as is practicable. I can hardly wait for the day when I can go into a dealership and buy an affordable electric car, and can charge it on a nuclear-fed electric grid instead of the coal-based grid I'm on now. I want solar panels on every roof where they'd do any good and wind turbines wherever they'd be use

Depending on how fast the planet is warming, I would think the massive flooding would be detrimental to their growing manufacturing industries.

The IPCC Fourth Assessment Report predicts sea level rises of 7 inches to 23 inches over the next 90 years depending on scenario. The truth is that while it is possible that there could be increases in hurricane activity, "massive flooding" is unlikely to have a significant effect on industrial production. An industrialized country like China can build up a seawall one inch per year, or move factories away from coasts.

In every thread about global warming I see the same nutjob denialist theories debunked over and over again, yet with no change in the opinions of the hardcore denialists.

But still we must debunk and continue to debunk. There are a fair few people who just dont know how accurate the science is, a common question I get is "How can we measure air (CO2) from thousands of years ago", I point them towards the Wikipedia page on Ice Cores and say "because it's been trapped there all this time".

A denialist wont listen, they are just looking to confirm their bias (and tabloids have made an industry out of doing this) but you'll occasionally find a rational person who will listen. We aren't trying to change denialists, it's the genuine sceptics we want to reach. The ignorant never hold any real power.

You do not "debunk", you ostracize. The main modus of debate of AGW proponents from day one has been moralistic, not empirical.

Hence the conversion of "skeptic" from badge of honor to a mark of shame, and the introduction of the "denier" label to further amp up the hysteric persecution of those who dont go with the program.

This also explains the skepticism of the general public. Joe Blow doesnt know his tree rings from his ice cores, but he sure knows what fanaticism looks like.

After all, how can one trust a science where "skepticism" is career death? The answer is simple: One cant. And as the tip of the iceberg is now visible for all to see - the remaining question is how much is hidden by the sea...

Here is what climate scientist Edward Cook wrote regarding the accuracy of dendroclimatology:

Without trying to prejudice this work, but also because of what Ialmost think I know to be the case, the results of this study willshow that we can probably say a fair bit about 100 year variability was like with any certainty (i.e. we knowwith certainty that we know fuck-all).

Here is what Phil Jones said in his BBC interview [bbc.co.uk] regarding the Medieval Warm Period:

There is a debate over whether the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) was global or not. If it were to be conclusively shown that it was a global phenomenon, would you accept that this would undermine the premise that mean surface atmospheric temperatures during the latter part of the 20th Century were unprecedented?

There is much debate over whether the Medieval Warm Period was global in extent or not. The MWP is most clearly expressed in parts of North America, the North Atlantic and Europe and parts of Asia. For it to be global in extent the MWP would need to be seen clearly in more records from the tropical regions and the Southern Hemisphere. There are very few palaeoclimatic records for these latter two regions.

Of course, if the MWP was shown to be global in extent and as warm or warmer than today (based on an equivalent coverage over the NH and SH) then obviously the late-20th century warmth would not be unprecedented. On the other hand, if the MWP was global, but was less warm that today, then current warmth would be unprecedented.

We know from the instrumental temperature record that the two hemispheres do not always follow one another. We cannot, therefore, make the assumption that temperatures in the global average will be similar to those in the northern hemisphere.

So Phil Jones is unsure if the MWP was global in extent and Edward Cook thinks we have very little idea at all. Perhaps the certainty in wikipedia is overstated.

Creationists, pro-tabacoo and anti-AGW groups fund and work for the same think tanks [wikipedia.org] that produce the red-herring theories. It may be obvious propoganda but their marketing efforts are nothing short of outstanding. I started debunking denialist on slashdot almost a decade ago, back then almost every one of my posts was modded down, nowadays I get much better treatment from the mods.

It's not the hard core nutjobs that need to be convinced, an impossible task. It's the moderate but disinterested observer who has been befudled by clever marketing. As with educating people about tabacoo and evolution, it's a slow process but a necassary one.

It's not the hard core nutjobs that need to be convinced, an impossible task. It's the moderate but disinterested observer who has been befudled by clever marketing.

Also, whenever someone announces that they've discovered that global warming is a big hoax it gets covered in the media and talked about for weeks. But when someone points out that that "discovery" is itself a hoax, the masses never hear about it.

Conspiracy! - No, just a small group of well organised, well funded lobbyists who have managed to get a large number of usefull idiots to follow them. The same organizations did exactly the same thing with "tabacoo science" and used exactly the same methods of obfuscation and propoganda. They are not interested in science they are interested in delaying regulation for as long as possible. I expect to be watching "coal trials" sometime this decade that will mirror the "tabacoo trails" of a couple of decades

Part of the reason one should be very skeptical of AGW alarmists is their rabies-like demeanor and aggression against all that they perceive as even the slightest heresy against their little modern day apocalypse cult.

Wider implication: Never trust the results in any discipline that is subject to a reputation cascade. (I.e, disciplines where even mild dissenters are ostracized)

That would be inaccurate. When have you ever seen one of these "unconvinced" actually get convinced. When they have their questions answered with science they either disappear or counter with more completely unrelated arguments as if that is some sort of rebuttal. That is why the science community gets so frustrated. They cannot win merely by giving a rational response.

I have NEVER seen someone make a decision based on these debates. A real skeptic or unconvinced person would be willing to accept the evidence once enough has been presented. That is why I think they are definitely denialists.

The "unconvinced" aren't the ones arguing with you, they're the ones who lurk, and wonder why if the climate change issue is so cut and dried both sides are so emotional and frequently irrational in their discussion of it. The science may be there, but if the attitude of those wielding it is pompous, arrogant, rude, or in many cases childish or threatening it does little to lend credence to an opinion in either case.

By that I mean there will be people that believe what they want no matter what the evidence. To be clear I mean there's zero solid evidence of Bigfoot yet some will always believe in it.

I think you got your analogies screwed up. Or do you compare AGW to Bigfoot?

I find it bizarre that people refuse to accept we are having an impact on the environment. The evidence is everywhere. I'm not talking global warming both sides of that argument are bordering on religion I'm talking how much the world has changed. Look at common resources. Ever watch any of the logging shows? What they are cutting now are so small no one would have bothered with them 20 or 30 years ago but in many areas it's all that's left and it's so bad that when they do find old growth trees the lumber mills aren't even set up for them. They are simply too rare to bother with.

Deforestation and overlogging are problems that do not depend on the AGW hypothesis. You're making the green fallacy of equating any and all negative changes in the environment to CO2.

Look at swordfish. They said 200 years ago you could all but walk across the Grand Banks because of all the fish. Now the swordfish they take are virtually all immature fish that have yet to reproduce. Most fisheries have collapsed, a fact. When was the last time you saw a butterfly? How many and how often? When I was growing up you'd see them by the hundreds virtually any summer day. Now I see a few a year. Same with frogs.

Speak for yourself. There might be variations in local spiecies populations due to human actions. That has nothing to do with whether CO2 is causing global changes.

Most great apes are down to a few percent of their original populations. It'd take a good sneeze to wipe them out and they are our closest relatives.

Again, caused by deforestation and expanding human land use, not CO2.

People say the snow storms proved global warming was a hoax. Well guess what I live in central Maine and we have already lost most of our snow and it's getting up into the 50s. This is supposed to be the worst time of year for snow and cold. Don't believe anyone or any study if you want.

Greenland was colonized during a period of global warmth. That it is why it was named that way.

Medieval warm period wasnt necessarily a period of global warmth. It may have been a period of north-atlantic warmth. Other areas were cooler. This is one of the many areas where the situation is just flat out more complicated than any popular treatment would lead one to believe. Very often one area will be cooler and another hotter and it's bugger-all difficult to properly sort it out and demonstrate a *global* trend without going to a very long time-scale.

And it wasnt named that because it was actually green - it wasnt. It was named that because Ericsson had previously found it very difficult to attract settlers for his previous development, Iceland, because even though it was in fact quite green at the time, it just sounded cold and barren. So he chose a more attractive name for his second development in the interest of marketing.

The climate was not influenced then by Scandinavians driving gas guzzling, CO2 belching SUV's.

Certainly true.

Man is not powerful enough to change the earth's climate to any "significant" degree.

Whether or not this is true is far from a settled question. Mans actions influence the environment and vice versa and always have. How much is "significant?" There is some very interesting research that indicates even the tens of thousands of years of farming prior to the industrial revolution may have altered global climate significantly enough to be detected. However in the broader picture, of course, the natural forces that have driven climate change since long before humans evolved are still at work and dwarf anything we can do or likely will be able to do anytime soon.

I think the climate change scare is just another way for politicians to steal our hard earned money.

I think there is a grain of truth in that, but you drastically oversimplify.

Greenland was colonized during a period of global warmth. That it is why it was named that way.

According to the Reverend J. Sephton in his book Eirik the Red's Saga [gutenberg.org], Greenland was named as a marketing ploy by Eirik: "Because," said he, "men will desire much the more to go there if the land has a good name."

Yes, it would have been warmer and greener than it was now, but if there was subterfuge in the naming of the country then I don't imagine that it was a tropical paradise. It also doesn't mean that it was as consistantly warmer across the globe as it is now.

But it is also a distraction. Do you deny that being shot by a gun could kill you, merely because other people have died without being shot. Just because it got warmer then doesn't mean that we are not causing it to get warmer now. It is getting hotter, faster and more globally than it did back then.

Man is not powerful enough to change the earth's climate to any "significant" degree. But that big thermonuclear ball in the sky is. A billion petrochemical fueled cars will not influence the sun.

Nobody has every claimed that we are making the sun hotter. This demonstrates that you really don't understand the problem. The problem is that the heat from the sun is being trapped here. As an analogy, my house stays pretty cool even on hot days without the need for air conditioning. As long as it gets cooler at night, it stays pleasant during the day. But if it stays hot at night, it doesn't get a chance to lose the build-up of heat from the previous day and it gets more unpleasant as after day. The days are not necessarily hotter, but the accumulated heat energy means that each successive day has a larger affect.

Scientists are men that can be influenced by propaganda just like any man can be. I think the climate change scare is just another way for politicians to steal our hard earned money.

The climate change "scare" as you call it was instigated by the scientists, not the politicions. They don't just watch the news and think "yeah, I had better parrot that line too". They just follow their data, and all get to the same place. It is either a giant conspiracy or the truth. Which seems the most likely.

However, if you can come up with ANY evidence to back up the claim that it is the politicians that are leading our scientists around then please present it. Oh, have a look at all those CRU emails that were released. They should be able to tell you the names of the politicians who are giving the orders (if there are any). Come back and let us know.

Classical denialist argumentation from ignorance. If very small amounts of something aren't danegrous, you wouldn't mind drinking a glass containing the same concentration of nerve toxin as the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, would you?

There's so much evidence of our ability to affect the climate that it's just silly to ignore it. To get you started, read up on the haze of brown smog hanging over Asia [wikipedia.org]. People are actually changing the climate by simply burning wood. Now imagine what a billion cars c

Several investigations found his publications (newspaper articles)to be dishonest

From your link:

The DCSD did not provide specific statements on actual errors. On this point the MSTI stated "the DCSD has not documented where [Dr. Lomborg] has allegedly been biased in his choice of data and in his argumentation, and... the ruling is completely void of argumentation for why the DCSD find that the complainants are right in their criticisms of [his] working methods. It is not sufficient that the criticisms of a researcher's working methods exist; the DCSD must consider the criticisms and take a position on whether or not the criticisms are justified, and why.

A Dutch think tank, HAN, Heidelberg Appeal the Netherlands, published a report in which they claimed 25 out of 27 accusations against Lomborg to be unsubstantiated or not to the point.[13] A group of scientists with relation to this think tank also published an article in 2005 in the Journal of Information Ethics,[14] in which they concluded that most criticism against Lomborg was unjustified, and that the scientific community misused their authority to suppress Lomborg.

I assume you've read it and know that there are still plenty of other criticisms (like this new book) but as for peer-review and open dialogue I think it's hard to say that Lomborg hasn't had his work examined and even harder to say that he hasn't been forthcoming in responding to detractors in a far more transparent way than any journal I've ever read. I've never read TSE but I can't say that I understand where you get the "frothing" part of his response. Maybe you should imagine it being r